Unchained is sponsoring a new ad in The Atlantic. It is 4 and a half minutes long and features Joe Kelly, Nat Brunnel and Natalie Smolenski.
And it is a little preachy.
It's not on YouTube, so here's an X link to the video in case you don't want to go to The Atlantic's site.
It's easy to sit on the sidelines and take shots, so I do want to say that what Unchained is trying to do here is really hard: it's no easy task to try to reach the uninterested masses and convey what is important about bitcoin in one interaction.
They manage to pack a lot into the video (too much in my opinion), comparing the invention of bitcoin to the harnessing of electricity, explaining that it is decentralized and has a 21 million cap, and even getting into the idea of multisigs.
Compare it to Coinbase's two bitcoin ads:
And finally compare it to this non-bitcoin Coinbase ad:
I imagine that Unchained's ad appeals to some market segment, and possibly, Unchained has figured out who they want to reach and are hitting them in the bullseye. But beyond that specific target segment, I don't see this being interesting to much of anyone.
What do you think? Is this the way to make Bitcoin ads?
Perhaps another example to ad to the comparison is Tether Wallet's recent (fully AI generated?) commercial:
My feedback
Overall, decent video. It might be helpful for some people who respond well to this kind of well-dressed, respectable-looking-and-sounding primer. They didn't address head-on the most normie accusations though: "Bitcoin is used by criminals", "Bitcoin is bad for the environment", "Bitcoin is risky." So it might change a few minds, or at least plant some seeds of curiosity, and I do think the Atlantic is the right place for it.
A few other small critiques
I agree that they tried to do too much in it and tried to say too many things. Ads are best for planting one idea in as many ways as possible, absent words/narration, mostly with symbols/vibes/implied things, employing lots of dark arts to make us hypnotically learn.
Most bitcoin products are downstream of understanding bitcoin so they teach us three or so things:
I have no idea what I'm talking about, but I would've made those into three largely independent shorter ads. If I were limited to presenting them as one ad, I'd break it into those three chapters
I thought points 1 and 2 worked ok together and point 3 would completely lose anyone who was engaged by them.
Yes, I felt like I was following along, and then all of a sudden we are talking about multisig but everybody is in the exact same posture and smiling and acting like discussing key policies is a totally normal thing...
Yes. It felt like there were too many points and I got bored while watching it.
The coinbase ads each pick one point and dramatize it in a minute or less. I really appreciated that.
In a way, this strikes me as similar to Spiral's Who Is Bitcoin ad which is a whopping 10 minutes long. Even though it was split into chapters of sorts, I didn't like that. They could have made a miniseries and gotten so much more mileage out of it.
I don't think it's the approach I would take in trying to reach a possibly disinterested audience, but it's also not bad. If this is just another touchpoint for some people, it may subtly change perception just a bit.
I wonder if it is the case that there is an audience (very foreign to my own sensibilities) that finds this kind of touchpoint meaningful or reassuring or something.
I tried to watch it without letting my inner bitcoiner out of the cage, and it still felt preachy to me. Like they were trying to convince me that Bitcoin was better than crypto, but aiming it at an audience that doesn't care about either.
This.
unchained ate targetting family offices, hnwi and uhnwi. It's a decent ad.
Coinbase ads are better to reach more mainstream bitcoin curious imho.
I am a long way off from ever starting a family office of my own; however, if I ever achieve that exalted state, I will fire any asset manager who gets the ideas for where we should deploy capital from ads in The Atlantic.
"Rules"? Don't tell me what to do breh. Those are your (stolen) ideas.
I wonder what ad company told them to go with that angle. I know everybody likes listicles, but ugh, it certainly didn't resonate with me. Was it trying to be Fight Club reminiscent? Totally clashes with the rest of the vibes if so.
In that case it would've been good to see Kelly get beat up. By Lou maybe.
Really tho... "rules" on Bitcoin? Fuck rules.
The "bitcoin not crypto" angle is incredibly important and super key for that audience...
Kind of surprised that they'd go after the hardest crowd, the least-likely to change their mind on something like this.
Ballsy. Probably won't work
That angle is what made it feel preachy to me. Almost whiny, like, "We know you want to use that cool crypto stuff, but you really shouldn't because it's bad, m'kay?"
I think they could have skipped all the "bitcoin not crypto" stuff and just hammered the word bitcoin. Probably also more orange color. I think this is one thing Strategy has figured out, they are able to distinguish themselves with a color.
Unchained is blue, Coinbase is blue. It's hard to keep straight.
UC is kind of black-blue or white these days
Their website is so blue, it feels like i'm swimming:
veeeeery different blue... drifts into almost black
It’s great for someone already in the rabbit hole, but for the uninterested masses, it might just feel like a lecture they didn't sign up for.
Don't you think, though, that for someone who is already down the rabbit hole, it's kind of just telling them what they already know?
Perhaps that is the purpose, though: to make such people feel good about bitcoin and take the leap to use a service like unchained because they want to double down.
So you feel the target audience is those already down the rabbit role and not an anchor point to orange pill new users?
Maybe. I think it has more to do with trying to raise the profile of the company as a whole than it does with reaching readers of the Atlantic.
Fair point
don't hate it... but I was trying to think as I watched it, ignoring everything I know about Bitcoin, what does this thing tell me? (It still seems like technobabble and conspiracy-gobbledygook)... better money, money like it used to be, somehow like electricity, with pretty influential-seeming girls trying to sell me something?
That's why I think coinbase's ads are better. Inflation. Clunky old financial system.
If they want it to be about a new innovation or make it seem like bitcoin is this great new commodity, it probably should have all been about 21 million.
The electricity analogy is fine and they could have leaned much harder into that. I don't know why I found it so off-putting.
Not a bad ad. It's too long.
Not sure why they chose the Atlantic.
I wonder if it's really just a profile-raising thing. Like, they don't actually want to reach anyone in who actually reads The Atlantic, they want to be able to tell their audience, oh by the way, our ad in the atlantic really got some good reviews.
I appreciate that they’re actually talking about decentralization and the 21 million cap in a sponsored mainstream slot.
Most corporate ads strip the soul out of Bitcoin to make it more palatable.
Great advert especially the voiceover and animation
The new rules of Bitcoin - BItcoin is not what you think? I feel everyone has their own analogy of what Bitcoin does for them, to be me it boils down to its functions of
1. Censorship Resistance & Security
2. Trustless & Transparent Transactions
3. Absolute Scarcity & Monetary Policy
It’s a cool enough ad, a bit too long but very informative
https://twiiit.com/unchained/status/2052041335721378102